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Perhaps you can quote the most notable section of the Constitution dealing with foreign prisoners captured abroad? Good luck with that.
...That's all well and good, but my quote above that you're responding to was related to your original contention...you implied that the Bush Admin routinely denied habeas corpus to US citizens. They didn't. It happened twice and was stopped in 2004. Extending legal rights to foreign murderers captured abroad in an undeclared war is a distinctly seperate issue.

No, I said the Bush administration routinely denied habeas corpus. Where in the Constitution does it say that we have one set of laws for citizens and another for non-citizens. From the foundation of our country to the present the courts have not distinguished between the two. That's a point that I also made in my original post.

And yours? I actually quoted Spector since he is the senior republican member of the judiciary committee with a fair knowledge of US law and judicial procedures.

Originally Posted by Hew

There is indeed precedent in our current handling of terrorists. In '42 we captured eight German saboteurs in the US. Roosevelt had them tried by secret military tribunal and six of them were executed...all within two months of their capture.

The supreme court upheld Roosevelt's decision to use a military tribunal operating under the uniform code of military justice in trying the eight German soldiers. The basis for trying and executing the prisoners was that they were spies, operating without identification as enemy soldiers. Had they identified themselves as enemy soldiers, they would have been subject to the Geneva Convention. The fact that they were captured in the US had nothing to do with their treatment. Remember, that our own soldiers in Germany were captured in a country we invaded. The administration denied habeas corpus to the Guantanamo captives before it relented and suggested the tribunal approach. Prior to that it believed that no hearings were needed. Once it established the tribunal approach, it continued to deny habeas corpus and held that its actions were not subject to civilian court review. Roosevelt provided full protection under the law for the German soldiers including legal counsel and rights of appeal in civilian courts -- that's how the case ended up in front of the supreme court. A report by the American Bar Association on the administration's actions says:

"The Quirin case, however, does not stand for the proposition that detainees may be held incommunicado and denied access to counsel; the defendants in Quirin were able to seek review and they were represented by counsel. In Quirin, "The question for decision is whether the detention of petitioners for trial by Military Commission ... is in conformity with the laws and Constitution of the United States." Quirin, 317 U.S. at 18. Since the Supreme Court has decided that even enemy aliens not lawfully within the United States are entitled to review under the circumstances of Quirin, that right could hardly be denied to U.S. citizens and other persons lawfully present in the United States, especially when held without any charges at all."